On Ilkley Moor
by Garonne
Summary: A distinguished chemist appears to be cursed. Holmes does some chemistry, Watson suffers a series of unfortunate events and everything is pervaded by a miasma of eeriness. Not slash.
1. Chapter 1

**Title:** On Ilkley Moor (1/3)  
><strong>Author:<strong> Garonne  
><strong>Warnings:<strong> Mild horror. Not supernatural, though

.. .. ..

There is something about the empty, windswept bleakness of moorland at dusk which I have always found pleasing. Our carriage rattled along a hard dirt road that seemed to go on forever through the moors, and I stopped thinking about the case which awaited us long enough to look around me and appreciate the stark lines of the hills, silhouetted against the fading light. Beside me, Watson gave a small shiver, and then smiled when I raised an eyebrow at this.

"I'm a little cold, that's all," he said. "Not that this barren landscape doesn't seem to hold hints of the oppressive and the frankly eerie. Particularly when one is on the way to visit a man who claims to be cursed."

I could not let this statement slip past. "Ashdown has claimed nothing of the kind. You forget he hasn't uttered a single word in over a month. You are relying on his wife's assumptions and attempts at deduction, when you ought to be approaching the matter with an open mind."

Watson wore the small smile with which he generally responded to my attempts to train and improve his mind. Earlier in our acquaintance I had feared it to be yet another manifestation of the discomfiture or impatience I usually provoked when I tried such a thing, but I soon realised my error. Indeed, I am bound to admit that I discovered Watson to have one of the most receptive intellects I ever met, and I was frankly impressed by his progress. I never told him so, however.

In fact, while I have done my best to form his mind in the years I have known him, I am forced to admit that the process has not been entirely one-way. Indeed the case I now describe led to events in which Watson influenced me more profoundly than I should ever have thought possible. Those bleak moors were the setting for a time in which I was forced to turn on myself the keen eye I preferred to use on others and to reassess convictions I had long held dear.

Night had fallen by the time we reached the Ashdowns' country residence and despite my best efforts I could only gather an impression of a long hulking building, surrounded by a park of dense pine trees that must have cast the house in permanent shadow even in daytime. Then we were ushered into a dimly lit entrance hall of vast proportions, where Lady Ashdown awaited us.

She was a frailly built young woman, the lines in her face and the shadows around her eyes testifying to the recent stresses of her situation. She greeted us briefly before leading us to see her husband.

"He spends all of his time in the library nowadays," she said in a low voice as we crossed the cold stone hall. "Working away at I know not what, and surrounded by books on the most horrible subjects, with the most terrifying illustrations. The servants refuse to enter the library any more, even when my husband is not there, because of the books he leaves lying open.

"At first I thought he had simply gone - " She stopped short, blushing awkwardly. "I mean to say, I thought he had simply been a little disturbed by the accident in his laboratory, but then certain occurrences led me to wonder whether - Well, perhaps you had better see for yourselves first."

She opened a door slowly and cautiously, and ushered us into the room beyond. The library was long and narrow, and in almost complete darkness, save for a candle burning on a desk at the far end. By its light, we could see the back of a man seated at the desk, surrounded by stacks of books, his head bent over his work.

I had already seen Sir Nigel Ashdown on several occasions, having attended a number of the string of lectures he had given at the Royal Society of Chemistry throughout his long and distinguished career. I remembered him as a strongly-built man of short stature, with a full-cheeked, bulldog-like face to go with his booming voice. With that picture in mind, I should have had a great deal of trouble recognising him in the man who turned his head silently to stare at us.

I had been prepared for some change, for I knew he had been injured in the explosion which had killed one of his laboratory colleagues, a month before. But the slight scarring on one side of his face was nothing compared with the transformation in the rest of it. The thin, skeletal face and the red-rimmed eyes which stared out of it bore no relationship to the jovial, well-fed man who had lectured on the reactions of nitric acid before proceeding with enthusiasm to the port and wine table. He stared at us for a long moment, his eyes blank, before returning abruptly to his books.

"Mr Holmes and Dr Watson have just arrived from London, dear," Lady Ashdown said in a thin, cheery voice.

The man continued to scrawl on the sheet of paper which fell into his circle of candle-light, his emaciated hand wavering across the page. He ignored us completely.

"I continue to try to speak to him," Lady Ashdown whispered to us, "but sometimes I despair. He has not uttered a single word in almost a month."

At the edge of my consciousness I heard Watson murmuring some kind, reassuring words. I was aching to examine the stacks of books and the contents of those scribbled papers, but that would have to await a more propitious moment. Lady Ashdown was already ushering us from the library. She closed the door softly on that silent, oppressive room.

"And this dates from an accident in his laboratory?" Watson asked, in the manner of an understanding medical practitioner, which I always enjoyed seeing him assume.

I had relayed to him the details of the case, and in particular Sir Nigel's reaction to witnessing the death of his colleague, and he had spent the evening before our departure reading up on the effects of mental trauma on the brain.

Lady Ashdown nodded. "He refuses to see a doctor. Of course, he saw many just after the accident, for his injuries. But whenever I tried to bring a mental specialist to the house, he simply locked himself away." She fidgeted with the fringe of her shawl, clearly ill at ease discussing her husband's health with two men who were practically strangers. "But I know you are not specialists in that field either. It is not for that that I asked you to come, but for - for another matter, though it is all seems to be connected." She came to another awkward halt.

"Related to the content of his work in the library?" I prompted.

She nodded. "I am quite convinced that he is - at least, that he believes he is cursed. As soon as he left his bed after the accident, he shut himself up in the library of our house in London and began to read and scribble like that. I - When he was not there I slipped into the library and read some of the notes he had made. My heart stood still; I could scarcely believe my eyes. And yet I am sure he himself believes it."

"And you, ma'am, what do you believe?"

She hesitated before replying, avoiding my gaze. "Of course I know the idea is nonsense. But - we left London soon after the accident, for him to recuperate in the countryside, and the strangest things have been happening ever since: accidents among the servants, noises and strange lights at night - and then yesterday far, far worse."

Over her shoulder, Watson met my gaze, and I read in his eye a warning not to make the dismissive remark which was already on the tip of my tongue.

In any event, Lady Ashdown recollected herself at that point, and apologised for keeping us standing after our long journey. "Perhaps I can tell you the rest at dinner?"

Before following the servant who was to show us upstairs, I turned back to our host once more.

"One last thing, ma'am. Your husband's colleague, who died in the explosion - was he well known to you?"

I did not miss the small start she gave before replying. "We moved in the same circles, that is all. He had been to dinner at our house several times."

Our evening meal that night was a sombre affair. Sir Nigel was not present. His wife began by trying to enquire politely after our journey, but it was clear that her entire being was possessed by one sole thought.

"Oh, it has been terrible!" she cried. "I am beginning to think I am going as mad as - " She stopped short, putting her hand over her mouth.

Watson leant forward to offer some kind words, and I added my own.

"I think you had better try to detail the events of the past month, in chronological order, as clearly as you can."

What followed was a litany of strange noises in the night, impressionable servants who saw shadows, livestock on the estate attacked by supposedly unnatural beasts and other such products of credulous minds, as had already been hinted at in her letter. Suddenly, however, her words made me sit up and pay closer attention.

"Until last night, though, I still wondered whether there might not be a rational explanation for all this. But then, when I saw the stable boy burning alive - "

Watson dropped his fork with a clatter.

"It was the most unnerving thing I have ever seen," she went on in a low voice. "I was retiring to bed when I heard a commotion in the hallway and a frantic screaming. I turned and saw a fiery light on the threshold of the front door. It was one of the stable boys, wreathed in flames, writhing and screaming in panic." She shuddered at the very thought. "I do not know how he survived. And yet once the fire had been extinguished, we found him alive and unharmed, his body untouched by the flames."

I met Watson's eye over the dining table. He looked quite shaken. I reclassified the affair in my mind as more interesting than I had first believed.

"The whole house has been in an uproar ever since," Lady Ashdown went on. "Only the reassurance that you had already been sent for and were arriving today prevented the servants from departing en masse."

Watson leant forward. "How is the boy now? He has been seen by a doctor, I presume?"

"Yes, of course. He was completely unmarked, physically, but his nerves were quite shattered. We have sent him home to Lancashire, to his family."

Several more courses followed after that, but I do not recollect what dishes they contained, and I do not believe I even noticed at the time. I was fully absorbed in thought, leaving Watson to make conversation.

.. ..

After dinner, I went to knock on Watson's door. His suitcase lay open by the bed, and he was lining up his things with military precision on the dresser.

He glanced over his shoulder at me as I came in. "I have been very much wondering what you make of all this, Holmes."

I sat down in a chair by the door, feeling in my pocket for a cigarette. "Sir Nigel needs an alienist, the servants are over-imaginative, and Lady Ashdown is rich and bored."

"But the stable boy!"

"I know," I said slowly. "That certainly gives me pause for thought."

I sat smoking and thinking, while Watson's suitcase emptied rapidly.

"I have been racking my brains all evening," he said over his shoulder. "But I cannot see how what happened to the stable boy can be explained as a natural phenomenon or a parlour trick."

"Watson, you know how often I have insisted on the fact that the most bizarre and grotesque of occurrences may be shown to have a very simple explanation, if only one is in possession of all the facts. Have I not demonstrated this time and again?"

"But it would be a logical fallacy to conclude that all such occurrences can be explained thus."

I could feel a frown start to gather on my brow. "Watson - "

He waved a hand impatiently. "No, of course I don't believe the household is cursed. I was speaking in general."

I was somewhat surprised, for Watson rarely ventured his own opinions to oppose mine. "To accept that there are things we cannot explain would be to abandon every task of logical reasoning at its outset. It would be almost as heinous a crime as to make conclusions without proof."  
>Watson laid another log on the fire, and then turned to face me. "There are things you accept without proof or without explanation, you know. My attachment to you, and your brother's, the existence of God, the impulse of a mother to protect her child." He paused, clearly trying to think of other examples.<p>

"I concede the point, but they are almost always irrelevant to the matter at hand."

"Perhaps," he said, sitting down opposite me and changing the subject.

I had answered flippantly, but it was only later that I realised how serious he was being. I wished then that I had paid more attention at the time.

.. ..

The small clock by my bedside showed almost one o'clock in the morning when I decided it would be safe to attempt an investigation of the library. The house was dark and silent as the tomb as I crept downstairs, relying on my memory rather than a light. I thought to myself that it was not surprising how easily such conditions could suggest unnatural happenings to feebler, more credulous minds than mine.

As I carefully opened the door to the library, I heard rain suddenly start to batter down, and a distant roll of thunder rumbled through the house.

Still relying on memory, I made my way without mishap across the room, and lit the candle on the desk. I spent a few moment studying the books lying about in stacks, without disturbing their placement. They were a gruesome collection. Ancient books on mediaeval superstitions and witch hunting, their covers cracked with age, lay among more modern tomes no less imaginatively illustrated. I wasted little time on them, for I was more interested by the strange lack of paper on the desk. For the amount of time he spent scribbling away in the library, Ashdown ought to have produced mountains of pages filled with his writing. Indeed, there had been no shortage on his desk earlier in the evening. But now there were only a few sheets of paper with quotes copied from the books on the table, and the waste-paper basket was almost empty.

Frowning, I blew out the candle and left the room as silently as I had come. I climbed the stairs, deep in thought, with thunder rolling around me. As I reached the very top floor, my attention was caught by a dull thudding noise, as of something falling from a great height. Disturbed, I stopped to lean over the banisters and look down into the hall far below. I thought I could discern a dark bundle on the stone floor, about the size of a man. Then lightning flashed, illuminating the hall through the windows high up above the door. I saw more clearly, and my heart nearly stopped.

It was Watson, lying on his back on the stone floor, his limbs twisted out at unnatural angles. But it was his face that had made my heart clench. It was covered in blood, his head twisted horribly to one side. He was a long way away, and in the split-second I had seen him, I had not been able to make out the details of his injuries. I spun on my heel and began to race down the stairs, my heart pounding. Those stairs seemed a thousand times longer than they had when I had descended half an hour before.

I crossed the hallway in the dark, dropping to my knees beside the dark bundle that was Watson. He stirred as I reached out to touch his arm, and my breath came a little easier.

The storm was directly overhead now, and as I fumbled in my pockets for a match, another flash of lightning showed me his face, unmarked and bloodless, not even bruised.

I knelt there for a moment, doubting my own senses, my head spinning. Fumbling in my pocket with hands that were not quite steady, I eventually found a match and struck it. The light lasted long enough for me to see Watson's eyes flicker open.

I jumped to my feet and ran to the table by the door. Knocking off several ornaments in my haste, I grasped the candle and heavy ornate candlestick I had noted on our arrival, and hastened to light it.

When I returned to Watson's side, he was awake and struggling to sit up, clutching his head.

"Are you all right, Holmes?" he said, blinking vaguely at me in the candlelight. "You look white as a sheet."

"Never mind me," I snapped. "And stop moving. I heard something fall from a great height."

"Well, I don't think it was me," he said, already sitting up. "Ouch! I believe I've sprained something. Several somethings." He looked around vaguely. "What on earth is going on, Holmes?"

"I thought you - " I hesitated. Had I hallucinated, or been fooled by an optical illusion? And yet I was certainly I had seen quite clearly. There were some strange and suspicious things going on in this house.

I turned back to Watson, who was groaning and holding one arm cradled in the other.

"Close your eyes," I said, holding the candle close to his face. There was no trace of blood anywhere on him, however, and his skin was quite clean and dry.

"Your collar is damp," I said grimly. But I was unable to deny the moment of sheer panic I had felt, and the moments after I reached him in which I believed that anything could be true.


	2. Chapter 2

_Watson's POV_

The following morning Holmes insisted on meticulously examining the place where he had found me lying, though from his frustrated expression afterwards I could tell there was nothing untoward to be seen there. He scraped up some samples of dust all the same and drew a few threads of fabric from the jacket I had been wearing. He even insisted on plucking hairs from my moustache, despite my indignant protests.

It was clear to me from the intensity of this investigation that something more had happened the previous night than I knew at the time. Holmes' deadly white face as he knelt beside me was still clear in my mind. It took no small amount of prompting, but he eventually confessed what he had seen, or thought he had seen, when he looked down at me from the upper floor.

"It was extremely convincing," he said as we sat in my bedroom after breakfast. "And yet I refuse to believe I allowed my imagination to get the better of me, and to put what I saw down to something from beyond this world is out of the question."

I put a hand to my face, shuddering inwardly at the idea of the third possible explanation: that someone had drugged me and transformed me into a horrible tableau for Holmes' benefit.

He began to pace up and down the room, his brows drawn together in a fierce scowl. I guessed him to be chafing without his chemical equipment, a supposition borne out by his next words.

"Do you happen to have a bottle of tincture of iodine in your medical case, Watson?"

"I'm afraid not," I said. "I favour carbolic acid as an antiseptic."

He glowered at this perfectly reasonable choice.

"Perhaps you could ask Lady Ashdown whether her husband ever had a laboratory here," I suggested.

He ignored this and picked up my shaving mug, frowning at it as though gauging its suitability as an experimental flask.

I was propped up on a pile of pillows on the bed, having prescribed myself absolute rest for my aching muscles. I was still stiff and sore from the distorted, twisted shape in which Holmes told me he had found me lying.

Holmes soon tired of pacing around the room and announced his intention to make enquiries below stairs, among the servants. After his departure I tried to while away the time with the novel I had brought, but my head ached and I soon dozed off.

I awoke with a start when Holmes burst into the room.

"My enquiries have met with a frustrating but unsurprising dead end," he said, throwing himself into a chair. "Several of the servants have given notice this week, including he whom I was most keen to speak to: the footman whose timely action with a blanket saved the burning stable boy."

"I'm surprised any of them are still here, in fact," I remarked.

Holmes sat frowning into the fireplace, his chin propped up on his fingertips. "I shall have to return to London this afternoon," he announced after some minutes of silence.

"Already?"

"I want to visit Ashdown's laboratory at the university. I have a few chemical analyses to perform too, and for that I shall need my equipment."

The man who the previous evening had been belittling Lady Ashdown's over-active imagination had completely vanished. Holmes now seemed to be taking the case much more seriously, indeed I might say personally. With my aching limbs and head, I cannot say I disapproved.

Holmes left later that afternoon to catch the last train to London, after giving me a list of instructions and admonitions and commanding me to observe it to the letter. I was feeling much better by then and was even able to descend to dinner with only a slight hobble in my step.

Lady Ashdown was subdued throughout the meal. After enquiring after my health, she scarcely looked up from her meal long enough to make monosyllabic replies to my attempts at conversation.

As per Holmes' instructions, I ate only from the dishes Lady Ashdown also took and managed to wipe my glass and cutlery discreetly with my handkerchief before the meal began. If the servants or Lady Ashdown noticed, they gave no indication of it. Indeed, they appeared to have other things on their minds; the atmosphere was distinctly nervy. Everyone seemed on edge, and the crash of the sauce jug dropped by an unfortunate footman caused the most frightful commotion among his nervous fellows. I was relieved to escape to my room.

I was staying on the uppermost floor of the house and the corridor there was narrow and poorly lit. As I fumbled with the doorknob I heard footsteps behind me and turned to see Sir Nigel standing at the end of the corridor, his face lit from below by the candle he held. He looked dreadful, his red-rimmed eyes disappearing into the shadows of his haggard face. I was under strict instructions from Holmes not to approach him, but my heart went out to the man; I could not help it. I took a step towards him.

"Good evening, Sir Nigel. Isn't there something I can do to help you?"

He stared at me for a moment in silence and in spite of my initial feeling of compassion I could not help shivering, such was the intensity of his gaze. Then he turned and vanished through a door I could not see, and I was left feeling vaguely uneasy.

I was relieved to regain the comfort of my room, where the fire was already lit, the candles already burning and everything warm and cosy. I began to feel a little better. I have never been fond of reading or writing by candlelight, and so decided to go immediately to sleep.

I awoke some hours later from unpleasant dreams. The fire had died out and I lay there in the dark, wondering what sound had disturbed my sleep. Then I saw something that shocked me fully awake. A eerie blue light was flickering in the corner of the room.

My heart began to pound and I had to suppress a sudden childish impulse to hide under the bed-covers. I took a deep breath, reminding myself that in any other house but this one, I should have been intrigued rather than alarmed. There was certainly some perfectly rational explanation. Investigation was called for.

I lit a candle and the room was thrown into light. There was nothing untoward to be seen in that corner, merely the dresser with my shaving things, the washstand with a jug of water and the book I had been reading earlier in the day. Somehow this normality was even more unnerving.

I took another deep breath to calm myself, blew out the candle and lay down in bed. The light flickered back into sight. Was it my imagination or was it drawing closer?

I shut my eyes, trying to slow my racing heart. I could hardly sleep with the candle lit, like a child. Nonetheless, I wished I were in London and could fill the room with electric light or even gaslight, instead of this damned candlelight.

Then a tapping noise began to echo through the room, its source indeterminable. I was so startled, in my highly nervous state, that I jumped an inch in the bed.

I sat frozen, petrified. To my fevered imagination, it appeared that the noise was growing louder and the light growing stronger, as though I should be overwhelmed at any moment. Then, as abruptly as it had begun, the noise stopped, the light vanished and all was calm.

After some time I gathered myself together and climbed out of bed, determined to search the room from top to bottom, for I knew I should never sleep otherwise. I began by lighting the candle and checking whether the door was properly closed, before going to the window. There was a grassy area behind the house, which would have been classed as a lawn were it not so ill-kept. The moon was full and by its light, I saw Lady Ashdown standing in the middle of the grass, staring up at the house as though in a trance.

I forgot my fear instantly, my one thought being to go to her aid. It was the matter of a few moments to throw on some clothes and hurry downstairs, although locating an oil lamp and then the back door took somewhat longer. Nevertheless, I reached the garden in time to see Lady Ashdown disappearing into the dark mass of pine trees that surrounded the house.

I hurried after her, ignoring my aching muscles. Soon the trees thinned and the ground underfoot began to rise. We emerged from the hollow in which the house was built and out onto the open moors. Lady Ashdown was a small, white-clad figure in the moonlight ahead of me, disappearing and reappearing as she crossed the hilly ground.

For the moment she seemed to be in no immediate danger and so I kept her in sight without attempting to overtake her. A cold wind swept across the open, desolate ground and I was glad of my coat.

We had covered almost a mile when the moon disappeared behind a cloud and we were plunged into darkness. I was suddenly aware of how dark and lonely it was out here on the open moors. I fumbled for a match to light my lamp, but the moon emerged from its cover before I was obliged to do so. I did not feel any better now in the moonlight; indeed, I felt horribly exposed out in the open, on that dark moor where anything could have been hiding behind the nearest rocky outcrop or curve in the ground.

Lady Ashdown was nowhere to be seen but, topping the next hillock, I found the track we followed led past some broken-down stone buildings to a narrow old bridge.

The moonlight shone on something small and white lying in the heather by the bridge. It was a crumpled piece of paper. I picked it up and smoothed it out.

_My dear Beatrice,_

_mourn no more, but rejoice, for I have not left this world and I await you by the bridge. I beg you, come to my aid._

_Sincerely yours,_  
><em>Edmund Ellis<em>

I stared in confusion. Beatrice was Lady Ashdown's Christian name but Edmund Ellis... _I have not left this world..._

Suddenly it came to me, and my blood ran cold. Dr Edmund Ellis was the name of the chemist who had been killed in Ashdown's laboratory. My heart raced as I stared at the note, thinking of the ghostly hand which must have penned it.

.. .. .. ..


	3. Chapter 3

_Holmes' POV_

I arrived deliberately early at the university, after a brief few hours' sleep in Baker Street. A bleary-eyed porter directed me to Ashdown's laboratory, through the silent and deserted corridors of the chemistry department. As I had hoped, the laboratory was almost empty, its only occupant being a young student washing glassware in a corner.

Ready to welcome any distraction, he barely glanced at the letter of introduction Lady Ashdown had provided me with before bestowing a look of awe on me.

"Is it true you studied chemistry too, Mr Holmes? I read it in the _Strand_."

"Occasionally," I said, which seemed to please him no end. He grinned to himself as he led me to the scene of the accident.

The area, frustratingly but predictably, had long since been cleaned. All that remained was a medium-sized burn-mark in the centre of the wooden workbench, mingling with the stains and scrapes that already adorned it. Someone had laid out a set of glass pipettes in preparation for the day's work and to one side, used glassware soaked in an acid bath.

"Was this where Dr Ellis always worked?" I asked.

The young man nodded, his grin suddenly disappearing and his face taking on a solemn, mournful expression.

"And Sir Nigel?"

"Well, he didn't often come to the work-benches, of course. Rather unfortunate for him that he was there just when the accident happened, really."

While I listened to him babble about Sir Nigel and Dr Ellis and carefully stored the scraps of useful information I gleaned, I was looking around the laboratory, noting working practice, the position of the storage cupboards, the distance from Dr Ellis' bench to the door and so on.

I interrupted the student, making him jump. "I shall need to see Dr Ellis' laboratory notebook."

He hesitated. I saw his gaze flicker to the pocket in which I had replaced Lady Ashdown's letter, then to the door which led to his superior s office, then to the clock on the wall, before returning to rest on me. His thought process was facile to follow and I knew what he would say before he opened his mouth.

"I suppose it's all right..."

In the corner of the room was a set of shelves filled with card-bound notebooks, their covers spotted and stained. I opened Dr Ellis' and found the entry he had been making on the day he died. I quickly copied out the details of chemicals, masses and temperatures, before taking Ashdown's notebook from the shelf. I turned to the final pages, but there was no entry for the day of the accident. What, then, had he been doing in the laboratory? Before returning the books to their place, I momentarily redirected the student's attention and tore off a stained corner from the final page of Ellis' notes.

I spent the rest of the morning working in Baker Street. After an exhaustive analysis of the samples I had brought down from Yorkshire, I turned to the scrap of paper torn from Ellis' laboratory book. It burnt with a satisfyingly red colour. Following that, I had a few hours to spend looking through my archives before the long train journey back to Yorkshire that evening.

.. ..

It was unsociably late when I arrived, but I had been loath to miss another night at the house, with all the fascinatingly uncanny events which were liable to occur there during the hours of darkness. I sent the carriage back to the station and stepped into the hallway, eager to see Watson and compare notes.

Only a young footman awaited me, however, his professional calm entirely absent.

"Thank goodness you are here, Mr Holmes!" The fellow looked practically ready to throw himself around my neck. "Lady Ashdown has vanished and Dr Watson has been burnt to ashes."

For a split-second I felt my heart clench. Then rationality returned.

"What the devil do you mean by that?"

"Oh, it's horrible! They neither of them have been seen since last night. And in the doctor's room, there's a little pile of ash, and his hat "

"Nonsense!" I exclaimed. "I refuse to believe that."

The footman quivered on the spot. "It's true, I tell you. Everyone knows it. There are hardly any servants left in the house but me, and..."

Coming to the end of my patience, I cut him off. "I am going to examine the doctor's room. Follow me, I may want you later."

"Yes sir," the poor devil said meekly.

I took the stairs two at a time and burst into Watson's room. My gaze was drawn immediately to the scorched rug and the pile of ash. Watson's bowler lay beside it, burnt and distorted.

After a rapid search of the room turned up nothing else of interest, I turned to the door. The footman was hovering uncertainly outside.

"Where is Sir Nigel?"

"In the library, I think, sir."

"Excellent. Show me to Lady Ashdown's room."

He complied readily, his sense of propriety completely overcome in the face of his fear. He refused to enter the room, however, perhaps fearing that he might vanish as well, or burst into flames. I began my search, hoping not to have to delve too deeply into Lady Ashdown's clothing. I was fortunate; under a pile of handkerchiefs in the first drawer I opened lay a bundle of sheets of notepaper, each one folded over and marked iBeatrice/i. I was delighted and intrigued to find them to be notes signed by Dr Ellis, dated in the month following his death. I scanned quickly through them, noting the warm, almost overtly intimate tone. A most forward man, this ghost.

Of course, the notes said nothing about the relationship which had existed between Dr Ellis and Lady Ashdown. They said a great deal, however, about what someone had perceived that relationship to be. I was beginning to understand why someone had replaced the soda ash Ellis had believed himself to be using by lithium alanate and provoked the accident which killed him. I was about to remark as such to Watson, but of course he was not there, only the trembling footman.

I stood with the notes in my hand, thinking furiously. Watson had now been missing for almost twenty-four hours. I knew he had left in a hurry, forgetting his hat. Had Lady Ashdown had time to don a hat and cloak or not? With the typical profusion of lady's garments in the room, it was impossible to say.

My eye fell again on the most recent note. It was dated three days previously. It seemed reasonable to suppose that there had been another note since, perhaps prompting or explaining her disappearance.

"Take me to Sir Nigel's room," I commanded.

The footman almost collapsed on the spot. "Oh no, we can't possibly - "

"You told me he was in the library."

"I don't know for certain and anyway - "

I resisted the urge to grasp him by the lapels and shout into his face. I merely said forcefully, "Your mistress and my friend are in very real danger. If you find yourself with their blood on your hands you will have me to deal with and I assure you, you will find that ten times more terrifying than Ashdown."

He gulped, and beckoned me to follow him.

Five minutes later, I was picking the lock on the door of Sir Nigel's room while the footman stood by, too mentally exhausted by the night's doings to make any sort of objection. The lock was new, in contrast with the rest of the building, and the urgency of the situation weighed on my nerves, but I have never yet let such a thing trouble my work and the lock soon yielded.

Here at last was the pile of papers whose absence I had noted in the library! I took the time to glance through them, confirming my suspicions about the true nature of Ashdown's work in the library, before searching the waste-paper basket for blotting paper. I soon found what I sought, and in exultation I read the smudged and blurry mirror image of the ghostly Dr Ellis' most recent note to Lady Ashdown.

"Where is there a bridge in the neighbourhood? Not in a village, but somewhere secluded."

The footman frowned for an agonisingly long time in thought. "There's one out on the moors, towards Barden Fell. It crosses a stream that comes down from the mountains - about a mile away from here."

"Excellent! Get your coat and some boots for me. You are going to take me there."

He blanched instantly. "I can't - "

"Why on earth not?"

"I can't leave my post," he mumbled, not meeting my eye.

"Lady Ashdown is not here to call for you and I assure you, Sir Nigel is otherwise occupied at the moment. Now step to it, man!"

He shuffled his feet. "It's dark out."

I had been perfectly well aware from the start of true root of his reluctance.

"Don't be a fool," I said shortly. "There is nothing evil on this estate apart from Sir Nigel's twisted mind. I assure you, there is a human hand behind all of this, and it is his. He has killed his colleague and lured his wife away from the house for some nefarious purpose, and my friend with her."

He shook his head, refusing to meet my eye. "The devil is in this house, everyone knows it."

"The devil's agents may be of flesh and blood, may they not? I have discovered time and again in my career that this world is big enough to hold all the evil in it, without invoking another."

He hesitated still.

"Besides, I have an electric pocket lantern," I added, producing it.

He gave a sudden weak grin, looking ashamed of himself. "All right, sir."

I quickly examined Ashdown's room before we left, finding several jars of chemicals which contributed to the picture I was already building of his plans. A damp patch in the corner showed where a large container of some sort had been sitting. I sniffed it, smelt petrol, and frowned grimly.

As we passed, I glanced into the library. It was no surprise to me to find it empty.

The footman's courage endured out of the house and across the kitchen garden, though he kept very close beside me. As we passed a group of outbuildings, I noticed a light burning in one of them. I came to a stop and the footman bumped into me.

"I believe you said almost everyone else had left the premises?"

"Except the cook and some of the maids. And the boot boy."

"But of the outdoor staff?"

"No one is left, I thought." He glanced uneasily at the light.

"Follow me. Quietly!"

I crept not to the building from whose window light shone, but to its neighbour. It was a small barn, almost empty now that much of the winter's hay had been used. It connected to another building which served a similar purpose, but in this one, I could see a dark bundle of clothes in the corner. I opened the door with caution, not letting the hinges creak, and crept in. The bundle began to struggle, and moonlight from the open door fell on Watson's face. Relief flooded through me.

He was gagged with a scarf and trussed up tightly, dozens of ropes wound around him. I pulled out my pocketknife to cut the scarf and was rewarded with a weak grin.

"What day is it, Holmes?" he demanded as I worked at the rest of his bonds.

"You've been missing for an entire day," I murmured. "I've just returned from London. And keep your voice down."

"Oh, my head aches..." Suddenly he tried to sit up, almost causing me to cut him instead of his bonds.

"Watson!" I hissed.

He ignored this. "Lady Ashdown! I was following her across the moors when... I believe someone hit me over the head. If that was a day ago - "

"I have reason to believe she is still alive. Ashdown is preparing a spectacle with her as the star attraction. She may be just next door, in fact. We're in some outbuildings, not far from the house."

Watson frowned, still blurry. "Ashdown? What do you mean?"

I helped him to his feet. "He intends to burn her alive, creating the impression that she was struck by the same malediction as the stable boy. Except that she will not survive the ordeal."

Watson made a strangled noise, remembering just in time not to exclaim aloud in horror. "Holmes, you can't mean that."

"What's more, you were presumably next on the list. As far as the servants are concerned, you have already been burnt to ashes. Now come along."

I led him and the footman through into the room from which light had shone. It was in darkness now. The footman held up his lamp, revealing a cavernous space, half-filled with bales of hay. Lady Ashdown was sitting on the floor in one corner, her head lolling forward onto her chest, her clothes and hair drenched in liquid. The smell of petrol was overpowering.

Several paper packets lay on the ground around her. I knew they had been filled with chemical powders from the jars in Sir Nigel's room, which would give different colours to the flames. It was likely one of them had also contained the compound used to drug her.

She stirred at the sound of our entry and I realised that Sir Nigel must just be waiting for her to come round enough to be able to walk. But where was he?

Watson picked up Lady Ashdown and carried her out, while I crouched to examine the paper packets, the footman hovering nervously beside me and lighting me with his lamp.

I was gathering them together for subsequent analysis and identification when I heard a sound from the door which led further into the building, and sprang to my feet, turning. Sir Nigel Ashdown was standing in the doorway.

I looked into the face of the man who had killed a colleague and held a household in thrall to fear for weeks, not to mention everything Watson had suffered. Indeed I stared, unable to tear my gaze away from the savage light that now blazed in eyes that before had dissembled lassitude and misery. I wondered how such great intelligence could have become so warped.

He lunged at me, pulling a knife from his pocket as he sprang. The footman panicked and hurled his lamp across the room at the oncoming madman. It missed him, and smashed to the floor. Flames sprang up from the petrol-soaked straw and we were forced to fall back towards the door in haste.

Outside in the cold night air, Watson was kneeling over Lady Ashdown. He looked up, and his eyes widened on seeing the flames which were already spreading rapidly through the outhouses.

"Where's Ashdown?"

I ignored this and spun around, taking in the extent of the fire and the servants already coming running from the main house. I was gauging the rate of spread of the flames when I saw Watson dodge past me and towards the burning buildings.

"Watson!" I cried. "Stop it, you fool. Come back here at once. You're covered in petrol!"

He certainly could not hear me over the sound of the flames and falling timber, but he must have thought of the matter himself, for he stopped to strip off his overcoat, giving me time to catch up with him.

"Watson, stop!"

He twisted out of my grasp and plunged into the building. I followed without a moment's hesitation, my sleeve over my mouth.

At first I was pushed back by the blast of heat from the flames. Sir Nigel was lying at the other side of the room, by the door through which he had first appeared. The flames raged around him but he seemed to be unconscious, overcome by the smoke. Watson was stooping over him, trying to drag him towards the outer door with one arm while covering his nose and mouth with the other. His handkerchief was tied over Sir Nigel's mouth and I cursed him for a selfless fool.

Nevertheless I ran to help him, and a superhuman effort on our part got us out of the building seconds before the roof came crashing down behind us.

The cool night air was beautifully refreshing. Between coughs, I sent the footman for the police, while Watson tended to the Ashdowns and directed their removal from the grounds to the house. After he had done all he could for them, and tended to our burns too, I directed a guard to be placed over the unconscious Sir Nigel until the police arrived. Finally, we found ourselves alone in the hallway.

Watson turned to look at the spot where I had found him lying, several nights before.

"So it was Ashdown who twisted me into that horrible tableau. To think I felt sorry for him!"

"He was never traumatised in the slightest," I said. "Why, the only thing that bothered him about Dr Ellis' death was the fact that he didn't leave the laboratory quickly enough, and was injured."

"Because he was jealous of the friendship between his colleague and his wife?"

I nodded. "His jealous nature caused him to misjudge the situation and his arrogance convinced him of his right to act. After that first murder he decided to take advantage of his injury and amuse himself at the same time, playing on the gullibility of his entourage by creating the illusion of a curse on the entire household, culminating in the death by supposedly supernatural means of his wife. Given his warped view of her, it was no sacrifice at all for him to not speak to her for a month. A month, I might add, which he spent developing a theory of chemical corpuscularity and writing his memoirs."

"And composing notes from Dr Ellis to his wife," Watson added. "The poor woman, she mustn't have known what to think. No wonder she reacted so nervously when you mentioned Ellis to her."

The police arrived at that point and put a stop to any further conversation. I had not had an opportunity to confront him about his behaviour that night in saving Sir Nigel, though indeed I was not sure whether I wished to.

.. .. .. ..

It was not yet evening when we left for the station the following day, but the sky was overcast and its glowering grey hue cast the moors around us in shades of dark green and black. I saw Watson shiver again, and then smile when he saw that I had noticed.

"I am not ashamed of being human, Holmes. I admit I was very scared indeed at certain times over the past few days."

I raised an eyebrow. "Perhaps you will sleep better tonight if I explain some of Ashdown's effects to you?"

"I'm sure I shall sleep very well indeed, thank you!" He paused. "However, I am a little curious about some of the finer points..."

I sat back, taking a moment to put my thoughts in order before beginning an enjoyable exposition. "Sir Nigel put a great deal of thought into his work, I must admit, although the gullible nature of his entourage was no end of help to him. He had but to create the ambience, with occasional spectacular effects, and human imagination was more than happy to supply the rest." I paused, unable to suppress a frown. "I am forced to avow that the technique worked even on me, when I saw you lying on the hall floor. And yet afterwards, I am pleased to say, I found traces of rust and cornstarch in your moustache."

I saw his hand go to his face, thinking of the spectacle he had been turned into. After a moment he shook himself and said, "He had some accomplices among the servants too, I suppose?"

"Notably the stable boy who burnt so spectacularly and the footman who was standing by with a blanket. The boy's clothes burned, while he was covered in a thick layer of petroleum jelly, which was mostly rubbed off in the blanket he was rolled up in. The blanket disappeared afterwards, naturally. He was only alight for a few second, in the end. Of course he was well paid for the risk, hence his sudden departure from the household afterwards, along with the footman who held the blanket."

"He could easily have suffered some very serious burns," Watson exclaimed, looking horrified. "Why, he could have been killed!"

"I have no doubt he did suffer somewhat, despite the witnesses' willingness to believe that he was completely unscathed by this unnatural fire. And yet he still thought it worthwhile. I'm sorry to say that it shows how poorly servants are paid."

After a long moment of silence, his brow creased in a deep frown, Watson glanced up at me again.

"And that is how you burnt your hand, I take it? The injury is over a day old."

I glanced down at my hand, silently congratulating him for his observation. "Yes, I misjudged somewhat when testing the protection afforded by a thick gel."

"And the light and noises in my room?"

"I believe you said there was a jug of water on your washstand?"

He nodded.

"Did you actually drink any water that night?"

"I don't believe I did, no."

"You would certainly have discovered it to be Indian tonic water."

His eyes widened.

"It contains a compound which glows blue when chemical rays, as they are called, are shone upon it. I saw a fascinating demonstration at the Royal Society of Chemistry last year. One of Sir Nigel's accomplices among the servants must have been hidden in the next room, next to the hole I found in the wall this morning. I also found the apparatus, but I am sorry to say that the police claimed it as evidence."

I sat back, ruing the loss and wondering how I could get hold of something similar. I had not had nearly enough time to examine the apparatus that morning and I shuddered to think of clumsy country policemen cracking the delicate glass components. Perhaps one of Sir Nigel's former colleagues would have the manufacturer s address?

After some time I noticed that Watson was staring at me, his expression serious. I raised an eyebrow.

He spoke up slowly, almost hesitantly, "I admit to having been quite frightened at times this week, as I said, but you know, Holmes, foolish scares such as I experienced here will never be what truly disturbs me in life. What terrifies me, in fact, is to look upon the bleakness of a cold and empty soul."

I felt my eyes narrow as all thoughts of chemical apparatus were driven from my mind. I kept my silence, waiting for him to continue.

He gave me his most deceptively mild look. "Sometimes I wonder whether you care about anything you cannot pin down under your magnifying glass."

I could not help but frown. "If that is supposed to be a metaphor for anything that can be observed, analysed and categorised, then you are perfectly correct. What I observe and deduce is enough to explain everything I encounter. I see no reason to concern myself with anything beyond that."

"Indeed? Can you, for instance, explain why a perfectly sane and rational man would risk his life to save a known murderer?" He looked up at me suddenly. "Or indeed, why you would follow me?"

In other circumstances I am ashamed to say that I should have summarily dismissed the remark, but the fact that it came from Watson gave me pause. I voiced the first defence that came to mind. "It's simply that I must widen the parameters of my explanation."

Watson's mouth quirked in amusement, but there was something serious in his eyes. "Semantics!"

I sat back, thoughts whirling around my mind, while Watson pulled his hat over his eyes and attempted to compensate for the previous night's lost sleep.

I spent the rest of the journey deep in thought, my gaze turned to the bleak and desolate hills which were rolling by. I should not be forgetting this place in a hurry; there were certain things I saw in a different light ever afterwards. Though I never admitted as much to Watson, I believe he knew it all the same.

.. .. .. .. ..

Fin

.. .. .. .. ..

Really long author's notes (including some geeky notes for the curious):

One line was directly from 'Hound of the Baskervilles': "The devil's agents may be of flesh and blood, may they not?" Also shades of 'The Devil's Root', of course.

What Holmes refers to as 'chemical rays' is in fact ultraviolet light (the part of the spectrum that is just a bit higher in energy than visible light). Tonic water contains quinine and really will glow blue if you shine UV light on it. However, I think I've given Sir Nigel a bit more technology than he would have had at the turn of the century.

Lithium alanate is more often known as lithium aluminium hydride, which reacts explosively with water to produce plenty of hydrogen gas, which generally self-ignites. It's a rather common source of laboratory accidents. Poor Dr Ellis thought he was using sodium carbonate, which is also a white solid, but which is really pretty innocuous (think washing soda). Lithium ions burn red, by the way.

Holmes wants iodine to test for cornstarch, which could have been used to, for example, thicken a cauldron of fake blood ;)

Could the stable boy really have escaped almost unscathed? I think so, theoretically, with enough layers to protect him and a short enough exposure time. Unlike Holmes, though, I didn't feel like experimenting on myself to find out for certain...


End file.
